1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a water-proofing joint connector for electrically interconnecting a plurality of water-proofing electric wires included in a vehicle wire harness or the like.
2. Description of the Related Art
Heretofore, there has been known a water-proofing joint connector for electrically interconnecting a plurality of water-proofing electric wires as described, for example, in JP-U 4-27588A. Such a type of water-proofing joint connector is shown in FIG. 9.
The water-proofing joint connector is designed to electrically interconnect a plurality of terminals 72 each attached to an electric wire 70, comprising a housing 80 and a rubber plug body 90.
The housing 80 includes a plurality of terminal insertion portions 82 each having an opening which opens in a specific direction to allow corresponding one of the terminals 72 to be inserted into the terminal insertion portion through the opening, a plurality of deflectable support portions 84 to lock the inserted terminals respectively, and a plug-body receiving chamber 86 having an opening which opens in a direction opposite to the terminal insertion portions 82 to allow the rubber plug body to be inserted into the plug-body receiving chamber 86 through the opening. The terminal insertion portions 82 has an inner peripheral surface, with which an outer peripheral surface of a water-proofing plug 74 attached to each of the electric wire 70 comes into tight contact.
The rubber plug body 90 is integrally provided with a short-circuiting metal member 96. The short-circuiting metal member 96 integrally has a plurality of contact portions 92 and a plurality of insertion detection bars 94. Each of the contact portions 92 is to be fitted with the terminals 72 each locked by the deflectable support portions 84 respectively, along with the insertion of the rubber plug body 90 into the plug-body receiving chamber 86, thereby electrically and mutually connecting the terminals 72. Each of the insertion detection bars 94 is to make contact with the deflectable support portions 84, upon the faulty insertion of any one of the terminals 72, to hinder the insertion of the rubber plug body 90 into the plug-body receiving chamber 86, thereby allowing the defective insertion to be detected.
The water-proofing joint connector shown in FIG. 9, however, involves a high resistance to the insertion of the rubber plug body 90 into the housing 80, which makes it difficult to determine whether the insertion of the terminals 72 is adequate or not and also to set a terminal locking force of the deflectable support portions 84.
Specifically, the rubber plug body 90, which is integrally provided with the short-circuiting metal member 96 for mutual short-circuiting of the terminals 72, is inserted into the housing 80, involving the simultaneous fit of the contact portions 92 of the short-circuiting metal member 96 with the respective terminals 72; thus, the resistance of the fit is directly added to the insertion resistance of the rubber plug body 90, and the greater number of the terminals 72 makes the fitting resistance larger. For this reason, even a normal state where all of the terminals 72 are adequately inserted involves a large resistance to the insertion of the rubber plug body 90, which makes it difficult to determine whether the large resistance is caused by the fitting resistance of the terminals 72 (i.e., is a resistance in the normal state) or by the contact of the insertion detection bar 94 with the deflectable support portions 84 as a terminal locking portion due to the faulty insertion of the terminal 72. The determination becomes more difficult as the fitting resistance becomes larger.
On the other hand, each of the deflectable support portions 84 of the housing 80, required to lock corresponding one of the terminals 72 against a reaction force for the fitting resistance, must have a locking force set to be a great value, thus inevitably involving an increase in size of the housing 80. On contrary, if the locking force is insufficient, the resistance to the fitting between the terminals 72 and the fitting portions 92 may cause the terminals 72 to be moved away from the deflectable support portions 84 in advance of the complete fitting of the fitting portion 92 with the terminal 72, deteriorating the insertion reliability of terminals 72.